It was with Caledonia Police for 21 years, a total of 30,000 people were involved in the
community of Racine because my guest is the vice chair of the Racine County Traffic
Safety Commission, Tom Nitter is here, a little background on you, you were with the police
department for a long time, right? I was with Caledonia Police for 21 years, a total of 33
years in law enforcement service. I worked for the UW system, both in Milwaukee and down at
Parkside, and I was also with the US Marshal Service for a period of time. When you were
with a variety of assignments, when you were with the Marshal Service, did you have to pick up
people and transport them to different, you know, like if somebody had to warrant out in Florida,
they had to bring them back. Well, that wasn't one of my assignments. My assignment was primarily
just bringing people from either the local jails or the Marshal Service contract with or more
than likely down to what we call the Metropolitan Correctional Center, the MCC in Chicago, which is
a federal facility where the federal prisoners were housed. Is that nerve wracking to transport a
prisoner? I just saw that movie flight risk with Mark Wahlberg. And they have to transport a
prisoner from Alaska, from some up in Alaska to Anchorage, and the US Marshal is there on the
plane and the pilot, I'm not going to ruin the picture, but it's an edge of your seat thriller
because there are three people in a plane with somebody there, a witness they're bringing back,
the Marshal Service, I would never want to be in the same room as some of these people.
Well, they can be very, very dangerous individuals, and there's certainly always a concern about
escape risk, but the medical service provides pretty good training, and very competent people,
the deputies that were assigned to transport. I mean, radial people I have to deal with,
that's bad enough, but now I can, I would never want to deal with, wow, well, good for you.
Now, you worked my wife in Caledonia. I did. I was, she was the woman on the right,
one at him, 12, one at him, 12. See the woman. She was a dispatcher for Caledonia for a number of
years. And just in that little place, she told me some horror stories about people being brought in,
and it was just, and you wouldn't think in Caledonia, but there were some pretty nasty people occasionally
guys had to bring in. Well, I think again, when you're dealing with law enforcement, human nature
is pretty universal, and you deal with people that can be violent, people that can be anti-social,
and people that just break the law for whatever reason, and sometimes it can be some challenging
situations, and the law enforcement agencies have to respond accordingly. So before we leave
today, I'm going to tell you, I watch a lot of police videos on YouTube, and a lot of them have to
do with people who shoplift. I got to tell you something real quick, this Walmart, every shoplift,
there's a Walmart in Target. I mean, all these people just roll out the door and now they catch
you most of the time. But I mean, all these self checkout lines they use, and that's where they get
away with it. But it seems like every Walmart in America, people, the shoplifting from this store,
and when you catch them, what did I do? What did I do? I didn't do anything, and I'm not
resisting. Meanwhile, they're pulling their arms away, and we'll talk more about that later.
You're here for the Racine County Traffic Safety Commission. We're here to keep you safe,
and every month it's going to be a new topic. Now, you did this little background. You did this
for a number of years, and then I guess around COVID, it stopped for a while. It did. And now we did.
You brought it back in January, which was starting a brand new year with new tips. And these are
great tips, by the way. And in February, what's the topic in February?
This month's tip is rules of the road. Or in Wisconsin, the law enforcement officers that
are listening, they'll be familiar with chapter 346, those Wisconsin state statutes, which basically
spells out what is kind of known in layman's terms as the rules of the road. Now, these are,
everybody should be doing these. I mean, this is common sense stuff.
It is common sense, but there are some things that are a bit unique to driving a motor vehicle.
So people have to be aware of it. And once in a while, I think because driving is one of those
activities that, after a while, you get so good at it that it becomes second nature. And maybe
that's one of the hazards with it. More people, sometimes if you have something else on your mind
and you're driving, you may get from point A to point B without a crash or causing people to leave
the roadway, because you're sharing the roadway with them or whatever you. But at the same time,
it is really something that you gotta be attention to. You gotta be aware of the rules. And it's
important. It's vital for everyone's safety, including your own.
And number one rule is you don't drive a car if you don't have a license.
If your license is suspended, that's the same as not having a license.
In the eyes of law, that's, that's correct. Well, I have one, but it's suspended.
No, then you don't have a driver's license right now or wouldn't be suspended.
Don't drive a car if you don't have a license. That's, that's correct. That's correct.
Although now we're going into a different chapter. I know you do. All right, stop on the red.
I can't tell you how many videos I see of T-bone cars because they ran the red light.
And they figure, oh, just turn red. I can get through it. Yeah, but the other person's light
just turned green and he wants to go to. Now, I always wait for a second or two when I look,
but most people that they see the green, they hit the button and they hit the floor and they take
off. And that's how you get T-bone. Yes, yes, yes. And even even in today's world,
unfortunately, you have people that are intentionally running red lights. That's quite a,
quite a problem. I know you've seen it on the news, certainly in the Milwaukee area.
They've had a number of crashes where people just, it's not a matter of the timing of it.
For most of us, it's a matter of the timing. You're, you're trying to get through the light safely
and it's maybe it's a short time between where it turns from yellow to red and suddenly you're
in the intersection and through it. You know, the rule of thumb was that if you can stop safely,
even on a yellow light, you're required to do so. And certainly with the red, you're not supposed
to be going into the intersection at all. Let's go back to 1971, I'm on driver's head.
And I had a great driver's head teacher. And we also, what does a yellow light mean slow down?
He is, no, it doesn't mean slow that means clear the intersection. Get out of the intersection,
you're not supposed to be there when there's a yellow light. If you can stop, you stop.
If you're in the middle of the intersection when a yellow light can get through it and clear
the intersection. And I never forgot that. It's clear the intersection. Correct. So don't stop
in the middle. If you see a yellow light, get out of the intersection. You keep going and clear it.
But if you see it in the distance, slow down and don't get stuck in the intersection when the
light's red. And that was brilliant. I always thought it meant slow down when I was a kid. That's
mean slow down. It means clear the intersection. Correct. Correct. It's something where, again,
there's a few intersection that you see now. I know that like on highway 20, where it's approaching
highway age, you have actually a separate signal that starts flashing yellow saying that the
signal head is going to be changing. So be aware of that. That's good. Part of that is because
again, you've got a little bit of if you will, the site, the distance of site for you to be able to
see the traffic signal because you're coming over the crest of a hill as you go down underneath
the railroad tracks. Tom Nitter is here. He's vice chair of the Racine County Traffic Safety
Commission. We got a lot more to talk about. You keep it right here at WRJN.
Tom Nitter, vice chair of the Racine County Traffic Safety Commission is my guest. We're talking
about staying safe and it's rules of the road this month in February. And Tom's going to be here
the first Thursday of every month to talk about the new poster and some of the information out there.
You know, you think it's common, but I had a friend of mine who said common census and common.
And there's a lot of truth in that. Okay. We talked about what you do when you get to a yellow light.
You know, I was when I grew up some of the lights in the city. They didn't have yellow lights.
They were only red and green. And for yellow, they both came on. Red and green. I haven't seen
those that goodness because they're kind of scary. But yeah, they were I grew up. They didn't have
yellow lights. They had red green and they both came on. That meant slow down or get out of the
intersection. Okay. So now we're talking about a red light. Now you would assume everybody knows
what to do with a red light. And again, when I grew up, you didn't have this right on red stuff.
It didn't exist. You had to stop. And that was it. But now they have right or you can do a right
unrate, except where it says no right turn. That's correct. That's correct. And some states like
Illinois actually have something called the photo enforced, which means that what they do is they
they'll monitor the camera footage. And they want to make sure that you come to a complete stop
before you and make sure that of course traffic is clear before you safely pulling to the
intersection, making a right turn on red. And I know a lot of people try to beat the cars.
They see it. I see it on watching the damn you a lot when I'm coming up from Ohio. And they
make the turn and that you're not supposed to have everybody put on their brakes because you're
making a turn. I mean, they have the right of way. But I see people do it all the time. It's
amazing. Their cars don't have dense on them. You know how they do this stuff. So red means what
it means means stop. And it doesn't mean slow down. And it means stop. It's like a stop sign.
People say, well, I believe a stop sign here on victory avenue. And sometimes for the fun of
it, I'll just go out there and watch the people. They don't they cruise through it slowly. And they
figure out what people use it as like it's a yield sign. Yeah, I slowly went through. They
said, well, I said nobody was coming. It doesn't mean nobody's coming. And when I come to work
in the morning, I get I leave the house about a quarter after five. And people feel, well,
the rules don't start until 6 a.m. overnight. They're kind of loosened up. They're not loosened up.
I don't want to crash my car. We're not loosening up any any this drives me nuts.
Well, let's get let's go back to this for I go on a tangent here. Okay, tailgating. That's
a next thing. And this aren't going to spend a half hour on. But go ahead. Talk about tailgating.
Well, tailgating is certainly dangerous. And you know,
violators can receive citations or even worse if they end up causing the crash and injuring
themselves or others. People just don't realize how dangerous that is. And I think we've all been
traveling down the road where, you know, someone is behind us. And you can you look in your
review mirror and you can literally see their face right upon you and you can barely make out
the front of their car, which, which means that, you know, they are much, much too close.
Yeah, when I come into work in the morning, it's dark. And I see people when I'm,
now the speed limit when I come in on 16th street is 30 miles an hour.
And there's always somebody. They're so close to me. I can't even see their headlights in my
review mirror. That's how close they are. And if I have to break all of a sudden, because
critters are running across the street at that hour. I got possums. We got cats. And I break for
animals. I don't run them over it. If I had a break for an ant, I get my car smashed. And
don't tailgate. Just because you are late for work. Don't make me speed because I'm not going to
speed that I go 30 miles an hour, 25 through downtown. Then they want to pass you. And on 16th street,
you can park on the street. So now they come up as they're trying to pass me as a car park in
the right. And now they want to cut me off. It just goes on every morning. I have a feeling
to say. Unfortunately, yeah, there are a lot of people that are really, really in a hurry. They
don't. Because they're late for work. They don't budget their time wise, leader, whatever,
and so forth. But, you know, they'll really be late for work if they get involved in a crash.
Let alone not the bad or poor feeling that they're going to get if they actually cause
something in all the financial ramifications if they do cause a crash. So tailgating is not a good
thing. You know, as a motorist, I can remember, you know, he would mention about driver's ad. And
of course, I'm probably in the same group in terms of early 70s learning how to drive and all
that stuff. So we probably receive much of the same information. But I can remember the driving
the teacher that I had for that. One thing that was mentioned is if somebody is tailgating,
if you can safely pull off to the side, let somebody pass you, that's the best way to go. You know,
don't don't risk even though you're in the right. Even though, yeah, you're in the right
technically, you know, and yeah, if a crash happens after the fact, a law enforcement officer
may come along and say, well, you're okay. But, you know, the person that that rear ended you,
they actually have more of the responsibility to keep a safe distance behind you, you know,
than that. And we're talking about, you know, these things are written, if you will, for
dry roadways, sunny, bright days. Oh, when I see outside and snow at time, we're not talking about
ice and so forth. We didn't mention it in our poster, but there is something regarding your
responsibility as a motorist to drive your vehicle in a safe and responsible manner.
There's sort of a sort of a catch-all law that comes into effect with driving too fast for
conditions. We're going to talk about break checking two in a minute. Tom Deter is here,
vice chair for the Racine County Traffic Safety Commission, and it's staying safe and rules
of the road this month. Tom Deter, vice chair of the Racine County Traffic Safety Commission is
here. We're talking about the latest staying safe information, rules of the road. We were talking
about tailgating, and now we're going to talk about, oh, I wanted to talk about break checking too.
Break checking is when somebody's tailgating you, you hit your brakes to like, you
spook them a little bit, and that's what causes an accident. Is it illegal to break check?
Well, there is a state law, again, one of the things under chapter 346, where you're not
supposed to put your brakes on suddenly, if you will. So I guess in a sense, yes, it would be.
Obviously, if you have to break because you need to avoid a collision with something in front of
you, that's one thing, and the person following behind you, if they're following too close,
there's a good possibility. They just won't be able to react in time. So technically, yes,
it is to break check. Again, we would rather encourage people to pull off the side where it's
safe to do so and let the people behind you pass, let them get on their way, and people don't
mean they break check. They hit their brakes just to make just to spook you.
They do. And I often thought that wouldn't it be nice if, over the years, of course,
they've added what we call the third brake light, which is either, depending on the vehicle,
it's somewhere located near the rear window of the vehicle either at the top of it or the bottom
of it, in addition to the brake lights that you have on the tailgate, if you will, of your vehicle.
I started to be a good idea if the manufacturers would come up with something that you could push
a button and say, please back off or something like that, but I'm not so sure back off, we're going
to some, yeah, I'm sure there would be some people that would change what it would say or whatever,
so that my backfire, but have some traveling signs you can type in and do something.
But yeah, back in the 60s, a little kid, a guy named Robbie Jacobs on my block had everybody
come see his new car because they had something new in it. We had never seen before seat belts.
And these were the seat belts. They just went around your waist. That was it.
We all got a chance to go in his car and put on the seat belt. We've never seen it before.
No cars had him. It's hard to believe that people are driving around that seat belt, but that's
just the way it was. They weren't around it. So I saw it as brand new station wagon.
And now it's a law. It's a law in all 50 states. I would assume.
Yes, yes, yes, absolutely. And I like when the police say they could see people when they pull
them over, reach over slowly and grab the seat belt. And with dash cams and body cams, we see
you do it. I mean, we see you pull it on there. Now seat belts do save lives because when there's
a crash, I mean, you have a choice. Go through the window or not go through the window.
If you go through the window, it's not going to be good.
Well, not just going through the window, but I mean, actually hitting your head or something
inside the vehicle, the what's called the pillars that sort of support the roof line that,
you know, the windshield is there and then you got those two pillars that kind of the windshield
attaches to. You know, I've seen there were the years where people were not wearing their
safety belt. And unfortunately, they they hit the pillar and had significant head injury.
Or even worse would be if if the vehicle, if you a person gets ejected completely out of the
vehicle, not necessarily through the windshield, but through one of the side windows. And it's amazing
how much force there is that that happens in a crash. I had a fatal crash at 4 mile and
highway 38 that I was involved in the investigation on and there was a woman that obviously was not
wearing her safety belt that actually got ejected through the rear window or vehicle.
And when I got there wasn't wasn't too much I could do. I think she was already deceased,
but yeah, I mean, that's some of these violent crashes. People don't don't realize that seat belts
are kind of an interesting thing. They didn't come into state law, I think until I think in Wisconsin,
it was like 1963 or something like that. But surprisingly, and you might remember this too,
Don, at least when I was a kid, even though seat belts were required in motor vehicles,
a lot of times people wouldn't wear them unless they were going on a trip on highway.
If they were going on the interstate system where it was a high rate of speed,
then they would put the safety belt on. And that was only the really waste belt. And that was
only the shoulder harness, right? Yeah, just a waste belt. And then there was some revolution,
then there was something where you might recall the days where there was actually a shoulder belt
that then would be sort of clipped to the, if whether the rough line of either the driver's side,
the passenger's side, the front only, and where you could, again, snap that in the place.
And eventually they went to something called the three point harnessing where you have it now,
where you reach over and you have the seat belt and the shoulder belt on one thing.
And you know what? It's second nature to me. I mean, I don't even think about it. It just,
I get in and just pull the seat belt around. It just, I don't even think about it anymore.
So you do know. And again, it's a motor habit, you know, just like you're, you know,
technically you're supposed to be getting in and every time, you know, adjusting the seat and
the mirror and all that stuff to make sure that you're ready to go. Most people don't.
But, you know, we certainly do encourage them to wear the seat belts. I would, when I did some of
the public events with individuals out in Caledonia, a lot of times, you know, again, we'd
encourage seat belt use. But I always had one person that would come up to me and they'd say,
well, back in 1964 or 1965, if I had been wearing a seat belt, and I was in a crash, you know,
I would have been killed, which is possible. I mean, I wasn't there. But again, you're, you're
playing the odds with, with this, you know, and definitely seat belts and, you know, nothing is
absolutely, yeah, that's, that's correct. But what I mean, it really does. And we, we actually,
with, with this month, we, we actually updated a statistic. We, we try not to use too many
statistics in our posters. And we had one. The last one was actually from 2013. And so if I,
well, we better try to update this one a little bit. And we've got the listed here. It says,
in 2023, economic losses from traffic fatalities and injuries in Wisconsin cost more than $33.2
billion, according to the 2023 Wisconsin traffic crash facts. So it's, it's not just injuries
we're talking about there. We're talking about an economic cost to the individual and to society
in general. Now also in cars, the manufacturers made it very annoying. If you don't put a seat belt
on, they got lights and bells and ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, which is annoying. And they
want it to be annoying. They want you to be bothered by that. Absolutely. Absolutely. And they want
you to say, I just got to stop that ringing sound. And they want you to put the seat belt on.
And that's what it's there for to annoy you. And the flashing red light is there to annoy you.
So would you seat belt on and get rid of that? And that's true. And, and I have to say,
and I haven't seen statistics for a while, but I think Wisconsin is one of the states where there's
a very good compliance rate for, for people using seat belts. Interesting thing. When I got into
law enforcement in the mid 70s, even the law enforcement people would not wear seat belts.
Well, I noticed that on the, I watched that show on patrol live on the Reels channel. They never
wear seat belts. Occasionally, if they're in a high high speed pursuit, they'll put their belt
on. Other than that, they, they just in and out of the car. They don't use them.
Everybody always says, when you talk about seat belts, and I think I know the answer for this,
let's see what you say, school buses do not have seat belts for the students on the buses.
And I've seen things go where they have an accident. These kids are around like little
lot of balls flying all over the bus, but they don't have seat belts on. Now, I think I know the
rule. I think I know why. If there's a problem, that driver can't get everybody unbuckled.
There's just no way to get 50 kids unbuckled on a thing. If there's a fire on the bus,
or whatever. So they just don't put them in. That would have, you understand it?
Well, I think that's actually starting to change a little bit. And some of it might be due to the
age of the kids and so forth. Just like there's laws that govern child care seats and so forth.
There's certain ages where it could be potentially more dangerous using a seat belt.
If you have like a two-year-old or something like that, that's not going to be
harnessed in properly. Then a child car seat is going to be the way to go.
So some of that may come into play. We are going to be doing something on school bus safety.
Maybe that would be something we can look into a little bit more and find out.
But I know occasionally it does come up. And fortunately, school buses and the same thing with
transit buses, these things are built like tanks and so forth. They're very, very sturdy and
so forth. But you hear about running off the road. You do hear them, right? You do hear
them crashes. And that certainly is something that we don't want to see anybody injured and so forth.
So I don't know how much of it is based on just culture of something that, again,
it has existed for such a long time. And how much of it is pragmatic in terms of, well,
would it be feasible for a five-year-old to buckle up or what have you? I don't know. I don't have
the answer on that. But you've seen these videos when there's a school bus action and you see it on
the camera and the bus. And these kids are flying, hitting the ceiling. They're like
lot of balls and they're flying around. I don't know what the answer is. If I did, I'd run for,
you know, head of the world and I'd fix all the problems. I don't know what the answer is on that.
Also, when my daughter was born, I see who was born in Georgia when I lived down there.
And one of the rules was a brand new rule. They do not release that baby to you unless they
have to come out and see the car seat. And the car seat had to be buckled in with the seat belt,
you know, the whole seat. And then they had to have a car seat buckle on the car seat itself.
And they used to have somebody come out. They examined your car. Okay, they can release the baby.
Sure. You'd be surprised how many people don't have car seats for their kids. A lot of most people do.
But a lot of them don't. And these seat belts are not going to hold that kid in unless he's got a
car seat. I know when Wisconsin, when my son was born, I know the same, same thing where
that time was ascension. And they actually had someone come out and take a look at the
which is a good idea. Now, law enforcement is involved in that to some extent. But actually,
public health departments have really taken a lead in terms of promoting child car seat safety
and proper installation and so forth. I went to a course that was through Wisconsin DOT
a number of years ago and occupant safety. And that certainly was one of the major topics was
car safety seats. And we had to put together a presentation. And we had one of the members of our
group, his daughter in law, unfortunately, had been involved in a pretty severe car crash.
And he basically went and took a video of the condition of the vehicle and then showed
the child car seat that was properly installed in the right location in the vehicle.
And that was pristine. And the child was just fine. And that's what we really want.
Yeah. Yeah. My father used to say, this is precious cargo you're putting in your car.
Right. When we first had my choice, this is your most precious cargo. You better take care of it.
Anyway, Tom Ditter is here. He's vice chair of the Racine County Traffic Safety Commission.
We're talking about our staying safe poster for the month. And this is rules of the road.
Tom Ditter, my guest, he's the vice chair of the Racine County Traffic Safety Commission.
The latest poster is talking about rules of the road. Drive right pass left. Never pass somebody
on the right side. And people do it all the time. The worst people to pass a truck drivers
because they can't see a lot of blind spots. And if you're ever on the road with an 18-wheeler,
you will lose every single time. There's no time you're going to beat an 18-wheeler on the road
on the interstates. So if you plan on passing them on the right, you're putting your life in
jeopardy because you're not going to win. Well, that's that's correct. And the same thing with
city buses. And I know a lot of these vehicles, they'll have some type of, I guess, a
quote, a sticker that don't pass me. Whatever with with semis, I think most people don't realize how
far back they need to be. And we alluded this a little bit last month with like a snowplow safety
where we say, stay back 200 feet. Part of it is because again, you're going to get the salt that
that gets augured onto the roadway that may end up on you. But also with trucks, large trucks
and large vehicles, you have to be able to see their mirrors for them to be able to see you.
You know, again, that's just the laws of physics and so forth. So, but with with this, we're talking
about primarily staying to the right. If you, you know, with the two lane highway, obviously,
it makes sense that you're going to be going one lane in each direction. But even even on the
interstate, you know, you see people where the left lane technically is supposed to be for the
fastest moving traffic. And if you're going to be going at the speed limit or less than that,
certainly you want to be in the center lane. If not the right lane, if you're going at what's
what we refer to as the minimum speed limit, like on the interstate, for example,
when I first got my permit, my dad took me driving the worst person to take driving because he
didn't care. He'll put you on the fastest road. And so he took me on an expressway. And he said,
speed up people are passing you. You're going to cause an accident speed up. And I said, but this
is it's speed up a little bit. Keep up with the flow of traffic because people are trying to pass
you and everybody and you're going to cause an accident. Keep up with the flow of traffic.
And he always said that to me. I said, but I'm going it. It was 55 miles an hour. I'm going
to keep up with the flow of traffic. Don't you see all these cars running by you?
So you're going to cause an accident on this road. Keep up with the flow of traffic. And I never
forgot that. That you know, if everybody's passing you, you're going to cause an accident if you go
too slow. And that's kind of the dilemma that that you face, especially for, I guess I'll call us
our polite Wisconsin drivers. If you go down to the Chicago land area and travel on the express
ways down there, you'll see that it seems like the speed limit is just a suggestion.
That's more so than the law. And I hate to say, but there is a little bit of truth to that.
And that creates other issues for like policies for different agencies. At what point do you
start stopping people for speeding and what point does speeding become reckless?
Where you're creating a problem. But there is unfortunately, there is a bit of truth in the matter.
And we can get into speed enforcement. And most people will say, well, I only go five over
the limit or I set my cruise control or whatever the fact is in Wisconsin. There's something called
an absolute speed law, which means if it says 55, that's what it means, 55. In true practice,
though, it's something a little bit different. And most people regard it that way.
You know, in all my father's years of driving in New York, you never go into an accident.
Yeah. Well, it's hard to believe.
Well, again, they're, you know, and sometimes I look at, you know, the NASCAR races. And,
you know, I mean, those are professional athletes. Obviously, they're, you know, they're,
they train and they've got vehicles that are equipped to do certain things and so forth.
In fact, I have to say, I have to compliment NASCAR. There's some people just look at it as a sport.
But a lot of the safety things that we have now and motor vehicles from NASCAR came from NASCAR.
Yeah. So they do deserve credit in that regard.
A last topic is blinkers. This is a hot point with me. Now, people just turn, especially when
they pass me coming in, there's no blinker to come into my, just pull in front of me.
Now, I remember when I had learned to drive, you had to put your arm out of the window to make
a turn. I don't think anybody does that. But you have blinkers. How difficult is it to put
your blinker? Or you just have to touch that little thing on the left of your steering wheel?
It's not a big thing. It's not a physically exerting yourself.
Well, no, again, yeah. And putting your, it's sort of like the same hand motions you do
is to write a bicycle where you extend it out left, left turn, and so forth.
I don't see anybody doing that either.
Well, I don't know. It was supposed to be that, and I remember learning that, having
that, I mean, with driver Z, because I think there was some concern that, well, if your turn
signals failed you, you'd have a fail-safe way of signaling.
That's good. It's a good idea to know it, but in practice, nobody does it.
Well, they don't know. They don't. And for the most part, the traffic, the turn signals and so
forth are pretty reliable today. In fact, I'll say this, I've noticed with at least newer
vehicles, especially if they have like the old type of bulb in their versus the LED now.
If it just, you know, you turn like to make a left turn and the thing doesn't flash.
Well, many times that tells you you get a burnt out bulb somewhere either front or the back.
So you ever see the ones who are when they put in their signal? It's not a blinker.
It's a whole row of lights that keeps going back. I mean, that's sure.
And that really gives you the signal there. But I don't know why people don't use that.
I mean, everywhere I, my wife and so you don't need to turn your signal on here,
because it's really the road is turning left and nowhere to go, except but I do it.
I just do it because it's force of habit.
Well, and you know, there's certainly nothing, nothing wrong.
I want people to know where I'm going.
Well, that that's the whole idea behind it is to again,
is the signal your your intentions that the other other people.
There are some, some things that we do mention in our supporting materials for the poster here.
Just read it to you here. You're legally required to signal before pulling over,
pulling in the traffic, lane changing, parking, burgeon, turning right and then left.
And yes, you can get a ticket for failing to signal your your intentions.
And that's that's certainly true. So usually, you know, as a matter of where you're supposed to be
using it, it would be certainly intersections and traffic lights overtaken a cyclist making
turns, which will be careful around motorcycles.
Well, you got to use hand signals motorcycles or bicycles is, you know, don't don't,
don't forget them. We, you know, the roads are meant to be shared between motor vehicles,
whether it be motorcycles or or or or cars or trucks or whatever and pedestrians and and
bicyclists. Here's how here's what you can, here's how to find what we talked about this morning.
Everything we talked about is at Racine County dot com slash staying safe. Racine County dot com
stash staying safe. Again, Racine County dot com slash staying safe. Just see everything we
talked about. It'll change every month and Tom will be in here the first Thursday of every month.
It got me somebody even more knowledgeable on these topics. And yeah, it's what Ford slash is
that? Do we need to say slash? There's no, the forward slash they people figure that out.
I think that's all I do. All right. It's like no, you don't have to put WWW in there anymore.
That's true. Yeah. Any more, right? They kind of figured it out. Tom Knitter's the vice
chair that we're seeing traffic safety commission. We're seeing county traffic safety commission.
Thanks for being with us. I do appreciate it, my friend. All right. You're a good talker.
I appreciate it. And for all your years of service, serving in the police department and public
safety, I do appreciate that. All right. Hey, coming up at eight o'clock at WRGN more local news
and timeless hits. First news from city.
